January 30, 2017

Meet Gennaro Morra of House of Meatballs in Westwood Village

Local Stories

Today we’d like to introduce you to Gennaro Morra.

Gennaro, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
So my parents are from Naples Italy. They came to the United States in the early 80s when nothing more than a few pennies and a passion for food. After working doubles in multiple restaurants, they finally have the opportunity to acquire their own little space in Beverly Hills. They opened Da Pasquale in 1989. The restaurant is still open today and widely recognized as one of the best southern Italian restaurants in LA. Now open for almost 30 years my parents are approaching retirement and are looking into other ventures. My father was approached by an investor to do something similar to Da Pasquale but more fast casual, however, he was thinking pizza and I was thinking meatballs. I won. I came up with a menu and fun concept that we thought was appropriate for Westwood Village, bringing quality comfort food with a twist at an affordable price.

We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
Struggles happen every day in a restaurant, you’d be lying if you said otherwise. Whether it be a leaky pipe, coolant malfunction, broken AC, or when the Internet decides to rewind back to the early nineties. Our largest, however, was ourselves. My father purchased this little space in Westwood while we were coming up with the final draft of our concept. We weren’t ready, we opened too soon within over ambitious menu. Our soft opening was a disaster, by far one of the most stressful days of my life. We had a total of 11 meatballs a vast medley of sauces to choose from and a never ending selection of pasta and sandwiches. We wanted to do too much, and we really had to refine ourselves and do one thing and do it good. The very next day after our soft opening we decided to delay our opening for another week and come up with a new menu comprising of only five meatballs and sauces and only a few kinds of pasta and sandwiches to choose from. It broke my heart but it was something that needed to be done. Ticket times during the soft opening we’re taking over an hour, and we knew in order to survive in LA we would have to seriously reconstruct our menu. We said to ourselves if we can do this menu and do it well, then we can grow our menu in the future, which we’ve done now three times.

We’d love to hear more about your business.
We are called the House of Meatballs, but we are much more than just meatballs. My cousin is the chef, he has the same pallet as my mother his aunt. We stick to our bones when it comes to our meatballs with traditional family recipes, but every once in a while we get our creative juices flowing and try to come up with something special. We are located right next to UCLA, and the students love us. They love that they can choose whatever meatball they want and pair it with one of up to eight sauces. It’s not just spaghetti and meatballs and fettuccine Alfredo. Were also loved by vegetarians, vegans, and people who keep gluten free. We have thought of everyone when designing our menu. As the manager, I try to keep the boat steady.

I’m a perfectionist and have a mild case of OCD. I come in in the morning and taste everything, making sure everything is by the recipe. Then after a nice espresso, I write down the specials, and prep for the lunch rush. After the rush, I take inventory and buy whatever is necessary for the dinner rush. It’s a nonstop train.

What were you like growing up?
Growing up in a restaurant, was really boring. My first brother wasn’t born until I was nine, and my second brother was born when I was 15. So I played the role of babysitter, while my parents worked day and night. My favorite things to do, to pass the time was to play basketball and draw. I never had any interest in working with my parents. But since I didn’t grow past 5’7, basketball was slowly getting out of the picture. I went to art school, and by day was working in animation, while at night I was tending bar at my parents restaurant. I was torn between which path I wanted to take. When a lot of my friends were let go by several different companies in animation, I realized that working in a restaurant was a much more secure future plan. So I decided to go that way and do what my parents did for me.

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